The Pythia program can be used to generate high-energy-physics ''events'', i.e. sets of outgoing particles produced in the interactions between two incoming particles. The objective is to provide as accurate as possible a representation of event properties in a wide range of reactions, within and beyond the Standard Model, with emphasis on those where strong interactions play a role, directly or indirectly, and therefore multihadronic final states are produced. The physics is then not understood well enough to give an exact description; instead the program has to be based on a combination of analytical results and various QCD-based models. This physics input is summarized here, for areas such as hard subprocesses, initial- and final-state parton showers, underlying events and beam remnants, fragmentation and decays, and much more. Furthermore, extensive information is provided on all program elements: subroutines and functions, switches and parameters, and particle and process data. This should allow the user to tailor the generation task to the topics of interest.

/pdf/pythia-6-4-physics-and-manual-3dvwmijpnq.pdf

PYTHIA 6.4 Physics and Manual

http://risa.stanford.edu/teaching/362/particledarkmatter.pdf

Particle dark matter: Evidence, candidates and constraints

This paper gives the 2010 self-consistent set of values of the basic constants and conversion factors of physics and chemistry recommended by the Committee on Data for Science and Technology (CODATA) for international use. The 2010 adjustment takes into account the data considered in the 2006 adjustment as well as the data that became available from 1 January 2007, after the closing date of that adjustment, until 31 December 2010, the closing date of the new adjustment. Further, it describes in detail the adjustment of the values of the constants, including the selection of the final set of input data based on the results of least-squares analyses. The 2010 set replaces the previously recommended 2006 CODATA set and may also be found on the World Wide Web at physics.nist.gov/constants.

/pdf/codata-recommended-values-of-the-fundamental-physical-4bsdant71c.pdf

CODATA Recommended Values of the Fundamental Physical Constants: 2006

Theory and phenomenology of two-Higgs-doublet models

We review the present status of QCD corrections to weak decays beyond the leading-logarithmic approximation, including particle-antiparticle mixing and rare and $\mathrm{CP}$-violating decays. After presenting the basic formalism for these calculations we discuss in detail the effective Hamiltonians of all decays for which the next-to-leading-order corrections are known. Subsequently, we present the phenomenological implications of these calculations. The values of various parameters are updated, in particular the mass of the newly discovered top quark. One of the central issues in this review are the theoretical uncertainties related to renormalization-scale ambiguities, which are substantially reduced by including next-to-leading-order corrections. The impact of this theoretical improvement on the determination of the Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa matrix is then illustrated. [S0034-6861(96)00304-2]

Weak decays beyond leading logarithms

We complete here our work on isospin violation in the K -> 3 pi system We first calculate K -> 2 pi to the same order as we did K -> 3 pi in papers I and II of this series This adds the effects of order G(27)p(2)(m(u) - m(d)) and G(27)p(2)e(2) to earlier work We calculate also the lowest order bremsstrahlung contributions, K -> 2 pi gamma, 3 pi gamma With these and our earlier results we perform a full fit to all available CP-conserving data in the K -> 2 pi, 3 pi system including isospin violation effects We perform these fits under various input assumptions as well as test the factorization and the vector dominance model for the weak NLO low energy constants

Isospin breaking in K -> 3 pi decays III: Bremsstrahlung and fit to experiment

We present technical details of the evaluation of the elastic pi-pi scattering amplitude to two loops in chiral perturbation theory. In particular, we elaborate on the renormalization procedure at the two-loop order and on the evaluation of the relevant Feynman diagrams that can all be expressed in terms of elementary functions. For the sake of clarity, we discuss these matters both in the N-component $\phi^4$ theory (in its symmetric phase) and in chiral perturbation theory. Estimates for the relevant low-energy constants of $O(p^6)$ are presented. Threshold parameters and phase shifts are then calculated for two sets of $O(p^4)$ coupling constants and compared with experiment. We comment on the extraction of threshold parameters from phase shift data.

Pion-pion scattering at low energy

We study how general two Higgs doublet models can be constrained by considering their properties under renormalization group evolution of the Yukawa couplings. We take into account both the appearance of a Landau pole as well as off-diagonal Yukawa couplings leading to flavour changing neutral currents in violation with experimental constraints at the electroweak scale. We find that the latter condition can be used to limit the amount of Z2 symmetry breaking allowed in a given model.

Constraining General Two Higgs Doublet Models by the Evolution of Yukawa Couplings

We introduce photons in partially quenched chiral perturbation theory and calculate the resulting electromagnetic loop-corrections at next-to-leading-order (NLO) for the charged meson masses and decay constants. We also present a numerical analysis to indicate the size of the different corrections. We show that several phenomenologically relevant quantities can be calculated consistently with photons which couple only to the valence quarks, allowing the use of gluon configurations produced without dynamical photons.

Electromagnetic corrections in partially quenched chiral perturbation theory

We discuss the matching between long-distance and short-distance at next-to-leading in $1/N_c$ and show how the scheme-dependence from the two-loop renormalization group running can be treated. We then use this method to study the three $O(p^2)$ terms contributing to non-leptonic kaon decays, namely the usual octet and 27-plet derivative terms as well as the weak mass term using the Extended Nambu--Jona-Lasinio model as the low energy approximation. We also discuss subtleties in the momentum routing in the low energy theory and a problem in separating factorizable and non-factorizable contributions from the $Q_6$ operator in the chiral limit. We update our earlier results on the $B_K$ parameter as well.

Johan Bijnens

Papers

Isospin breaking in K -> 3 pi decays III: Bremsstrahlung and fit to experiment

Pion-pion scattering at low energy

Constraining General Two Higgs Doublet Models by the Evolution of Yukawa Couplings

Electromagnetic corrections in partially quenched chiral perturbation theory

The $\Delta I=1/2$ Rule in the Chiral Limit